Growing Apart
by Sauvignon
Summary: slash. oneshot. KakaIru. They were just growing apart.


**Growing Apart**

By; **Sauv**

* * *

Hatake Kakashi knew that he should have just said no when Asuma offered to show him one of the new poker (Asuma nudged him and winked) clubs. He knew nothing good would have come out of it. He knew that if he went he wouldn't stay loyal to Iruka. He knew Iruka meant more to him then cheap sex. He knew all that but he did it anyway. Kakashi was like a wild flower, easily swayed by the wind. 

It wasn't a problem at first. All he did was go there, enjoy the alcohol, mostly naked girls and card games, come home and have wild, messy, table sex with his favorite person. But no good deed goes unpunished.

It started to get a little out of hand.

---

Iruka hated himself sometimes. He hated it when he found out something he hadn't wanted to know. He hated loving strawberries.

See, if he didn't like strawberries so much he would have stayed home instead of deciding to go out and buy some. He would have never tripped over a rock and scraped his knee and he would have never walked by that stupid new club. He would have never seen his (_his_ goddamnit) lover necking with some topless girl through the window with her hand down his pants. They were so busy they didn't even see Iruka walk by.

Iruka had expected to feel furious and betrayed as he walked into the food mart, but all it did was hurt. It hurt everywhere and that night instead of strawberries with his late night snack, it was sake.

The next day Iruka had not forgotten. He woke up in his bed with strong familiar arms, long and lean around his waist. Kakashi didn't look like he had just gotten last night by someone other then Iruka.

Iruka lifted a hand to stroke his lovers face. It was rough from the shadow on his chin but he was still so handsome. Iruka cuddled into his arms, kissed his chest and never saw the dark blue eye open and watch the opposite wall guiltily.

The next night Iruka told Kakashi to be there at five o'clock exactly because he was making dinner. Of course, knowing Kakashi, while he said five, he really planned for six.

He had wine and tempura that had taken all day because Iruka took forever to cook being somewhat of a perfectionist.

Kakashi showed up at eight, the dinner cold and the wine gone. He was drunk and smelled awful. Iruka had felt sick when his lover had stumbled through the door. It was worse when Iruka had touched him. Kakashi pinned him against the wall and drunkenly started kissing him. Iruka tried to kick him, but as Kakashi pulled off Iruka's pajama pants with one hand and held Iruka's wrists with the other, Iruka knew he should have known better, Kakashi was a Jounin to Iruka's Chuunin. So Kakashi took him right there, against the door, cold and unprepared.

One might view it as rape, but it really wasn't. Kakashi and Iruka had had rough sex before and while it wasn't quite and uncaring and cold as it was in that moment, Iruka still consented to it. He knew he shouldn't have, but he wrapped his legs around Kakashi's waist and was willing to take anything Kakashi could deal out as long as he would sleep with Iruka tonight and not some floozy from a bar.

When Kakashi decided he was finished, he leaned against the wall. Iruka cleaned him up and put him to bed. Then leaving to clean up the kitchen. He sat on the counter, grabbed a rag, shucked his pants and cleaned himself up.

When Kakashi woke up in the middle of the night, feeling dirty and with a monster headache to boot, he wandered into the kitchen He paused in the hallway, when he heard a small muffled noise. He masked his presence and peeked his head in, only to see Iruka with his head in his hands, bent over the sink. He seemed to have been re-cleaning already dried dishes.

Kakashi knew why he was hearing soft muffled sobs, but he didn't say a word, just leaving the room to go back and sleep.

In the morning he found Iruka cuddled so close, he was afraid if he moved he would crush the Chuunin. Iruka's head was buried into Kakashi's chest and a wine glass was held limply in one hand.

Iruka stirred and the guilt was so thick and heavy and you could cut the tension with a knife. Kakashi _knew_ Iruka knew.

But Iruka didn't say a word.

Soon, Kakashi had stopped hiding it. Iruka still had dinner every night at six (planned five), every night with a wine glass. Though as days morphed into weeks, the wine glass soon turned into a wine bottle and Kakashi didn't even bother to shower when he crawled into Iruka's bed.

Iruka had stopped sleeping, the scent of sex too strong and the pain too deep. He couldn't leave Kakashi, he loved him and he _knew_ Kakashi loved Iruka back. It was just complicated.

The truth was they were just growing apart.

Instead of a lunch together at home, Iruka busied himself with extra hours at the mission desk. Instead of dinner, it was Kakashi and Asuma and Genma fooling around. Instead of dinner, it was Iruka and a bottle of Sake. Instead of a kiss goodnight it was a couple of sleeping pills.

Growing apart was a nice term to use.

Kakashi occasionally skipped the club to meet with Iruka for dinner but every single time he got there, he could never go in. He would stand outside the kitchen window, mask his presence, and see Iruka with a pretty display of food set out on the table. He would watch as Iruka would just watch the food, occasionally gulping down the sake.

Kakashi tried to ignore the paleness of the Chuunin and the loss of weight and the pleading look he would give Kakashi when he thought he wasn't looking. Kakashi never wanted this to happen. But they were just growing apart. So Kakashi would leave and Iruka would watch him go.

---

Iruka fingered the bottle of sleeping pills in his bathroom. His fingers were numb from all the sake and goddamnit how many was he supposed to take? Two? Twelve? He snorted. One Kakashi had given him twelve orgasms in one night. He giggled and took another swig of his sake.

Whatever, he thought his mind not quite lucid. Twelve's a nice number and he poured as many pills as he could down his throat and follow it by one last swig. He glared at the empty bottle and threw it against the wall, enjoying the shattering sound it made.

I hope it gets me sleepily, he giggled. Wow, it was working pretty good, everything was already going black, Iruka thought as his body hit the floor.

---

Kakashi wasn't even the first to find him. No, he had woken up in the bar, some girl cuddled up next to him, her body warm. He had left slowly, enjoying her warmth. When he got home, Naruto and Sakura were sitting in the living room talking softly.

"What are you two doing?" He asked as he walked through the door.

"Well, duh, getting some stuff for Iruka. He's stuck in the hospital, he's been there for a day already."

Kakashi had expected the world to fall to pieces but he felt nothing. He just felt totally numb.

"Why?" he asked calmly.

"I dunno, he didn't wanna talk about it." Naruto scratched his neck and went to go pack a bag for his favorite sensei.

"Oh."

"I'm surprised you aren't there." Sakura said, "He looked really bad and Kakashi-san I didn't want to say it in front of Naruto but earlier I found and cleaned up sleeping pills and a shattered sake bottle."

Kakashi felt that one like a blow.

"Suicide?" He said, his lungs suddenly feeling tight.

"I don't know." She shrugged, "But I found him this morning when I went to ask him for help on one of my medical exams. He's so smart and everything I thought he could help. But when I looked for him, I found him in the bathroom, choking on his own vomit." Her eyes were bright with unshed tears.

Kakashi looked away.

Poof.

---

He was at the hospital immediately. He gave the desk nurse a name and a look and she gave him the room number. He stopped outside the white door.

He was nervous.

The Jounin frowned and shrugged it off. It was just Iruka after all. Though when he stepped through that door and took in his lover's sight everything in mind froze.

It might have been the (lack of) color in his skin or the dark circles under his eyes. Maybe it was the way his hands shook uncontrollably in his lap. Or even the way his pupils covered his entire iris.

"You made yourself sick." Kakashi said.

"I had just forgotten how many pills would get me to sleep. I must have gotten a little too drunk." Iruka said forcing a smile that made Kakashi's insides hurt.

"Stop it Iruka." He said clenching his teeth. He wanted the painful feeling in his stomach to go away. He wanted the expression back in Iruka's eyes. He wanted the glow he used to have back.

Iruka cocked his head. He looked cynical and Kakashi felt something sink in his stomach. He latched onto one of the bars on the side of Iruka's hospital bed for support.

"Don't blame yourself, we just grew apart." Iruka said, his voice soft and polite and final.

As if he were speaking to a stranger.

Something in Kakashi snapped.

"No." He hissed, taking Iruka's head in his hands and crushing their lips together. Iruka waited patiently until Kakashi let him go.

"Is that what you did to all those girls? Did they like it better? Were they soft, warmer then me? Did they laugh nicer? Did—"

The slap echoed in the room.

Iruka's face was hidden by his hair and Kakashi's hand was frozen mid air.

"No, Iruka-kun." Kakashi whispered, "Never, how can I show you that?

Iruka just looked at him and shrugged helplessly.

"I thought you had." He whispered, "but then it turns out, one night, I must have went wrong."

And Kakashi watched as Iruka's heart finally, finally broke.

---

Kakashi was there at the hospital every day with a different kind of flower after that. He was patient and determined to get the optimism back in Iruka's skin. He would walk Iruka around the hospital grounds and feed him strawberries and hold his hand, not carrying if Iruka tried to pull away at first.

When Iruka finally got to go home, Kakashi made him dinner and threw out the alcohol and sad no thank you to Asuma. He held Iruka close at night and took pride in every time Iruka showed improvement, even if it was a gentle, barely noticeable squeeze of Kakashi's hand.

Kakashi made sure they never grew apart again because while Kakashi was like a wildflower easily swayed by the wind, he had deep roots. Their name?

Iruka.

**End**

* * *

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow. 

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

I'm seeing potc2 tomorrow.

worship me, bitch.

AND I SAW PHYSC YESTERDAY OH EM GEE I LOVE IT.

**comment please, I really do like it when people talk to me and if you flame me I will shoot you down so fast you won't even have time to dislodge your foot from your mouth. thank you. **


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